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Sunday, March 2, 2014

from: The Pilgrim’s Regress

One dark, cold, wet morning John was made to put on new
clothes. They were the ugliest clothesthat had ever been put upon him,
which John did not mind at all, but they also caught him under the
chin, and were tight under the arms which he minded a great deal, and
they made him itch all over . . .

The Steward lived in a big dark house of stone on the side of the
road. The father and mother went in to talk to the Steward first, and
John was left sitting in the hall on a chair so high that his feet did
not reach the floor. There were other chairs in the hall where he could
have sat in comfort, but his father had told him that the Steward would
be angry if he did not sit absolutely still and be very good: and John
was beginning to be afraid, so he sat still in the high chair with his
feet dangling, and his clothes itching all over him, and his eyes
starting out of his head

After a very long time his parents came back again, looking as if
they had been with the doctor, very grave. Then they said that John
must go in and see the Steward too. And when John came into the room,
there was an old man with a red, round face, who was very kind and full
of jokes, so that John quite got over his fears, and they had a good
talk about fishing tackle and bicycles.

But just when the talk was at its best, the Steward got up and
cleared his throat. He then took down a mask from the wall with a long
white beard attached to it and suddenly clapped it on his face, so that
his appearance was awful. And he said, ‘Now I am going to talk to you
about the Landlord. The Landlord owns all the country, and it is very,
very kind of him to allow us to live on it at all–very, very kind.’

He went on repeating ‘very kind’ in a queer sing-song voice so long
that John would have laughed, but that now he was beginning to be
frightened again. The Steward then took down from a peg a big card with
a small print all over it, and said, ‘Here is a list of all the things
the Landlord says you must not do. You’d better look at it.’

So John took the card: but half the rules seemed to forbid things he
had never heard of, and the other half forbade things he was doing every
day and could not imagine not doing: and the number of the rules was so
enormous that he felt he could never remember them all.

‘I hope,’ said the Steward, ‘that you have not already broken any of
the rules.’ John’s heart began to thump, and his eyes bulged more and
more, and he was at his wit’s end when the Steward took the mask off and
looked at John with his real face and said, “Better tell a lie, old
chap, better tell a lie. Easiest for all concerned,’ and popped the
mask on his face all in a flash.

John gulped and said quickly, ‘Oh, no sir.’

‘That is just as well,’ said the Steward through the mask. ’Because,
you know, if you did break any of them and the Landlord got to know
about it, do you know what he’d do to you?’

‘No sir,’ said John: and the Steward’s eyes seemed to be twinkling dreadfully through the holes of the mask.

‘He’d take you and shut you up for ever in a black hole full of
snakes and scorpions as large as lobsters–for ever and ever. And
besides that, he is such a kind, good man, so very, very kind, that I am
sure you would never want to displease him.’

‘No, sir,’ said John, ‘But, please, sir . . . ‘

‘Well,’ said the Steward.

“Please, sir, supposing I did break one, one little one, just by
accident, you know. Could nothing stop the snakes and lobsters?’

“Ah! . . .’ said the Steward; and then he sat down and talked for a
long time, but John could not understand a single syllable. However, it
all ended with pointing out that the Landlord was quite extraordinarily
kind and good to his tenants, and would certainly torture most of them
to death the moment he had the slightest pretext. ’And you can’t blame
him.’ said the Steward. ’For after all, it is his land, and it is so
very good of him to let us live here at all–people like us, you know.’

Then the Steward took off the mask and had a nice, sensible chat with
John again, and gave him a cake and brought him out to his father and
mother. But just as they were going he bent down and whispered in
John’s ear, ‘I shouldn’t bother about it all too much if I were you.’
At the same time he slipped the card of rules into John’s hand and told
him he could keep it for his own use.

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